Never Quite Like This (Kadam)
Title: Never Quite Like This
Pairing: kadam
Rating: PG-13
Summary: "Meanwhile, in New York, Kurt can no longer take Rachel’s arrogant attitude and calls her out, causing tension between the two friends."
Disclaimers: No one is mine. Move along now. Title from "I've Just Seen a Face" by The Beatles.
Spoilers: For 4.14 "Diva"
Kurt’s main worry in trying to ease open their apartment door with two steaming cups of coffee and a bag of bagels in his hand was that he would either wake up everyone inside with the screech of the still-unoiled hinges or that he would successfully open the door but end up spilling both the drinks in his hand. What he failed to accommodate on both counts was the fact that Rachel would be awake and ready to maul him at the door.
"There's a boy in your bed!" was really all he processed before there were arms around him and the both of them nearly went tumbling backwards out onto the concrete floor of the hall outside.
"Rachel!" he hissed as droplets of steaming coffee were flung from a mug in one hand but his annoyance at losing all manner of stealth was quickly dispersed as her words sunk in. There was a boy in his bed. A boy for whom he'd snuck out of bed early to grab fresh bagels and coffee because he was certain the ones they had left in the breadbox were stale. A boy whose very mention painted the widest of grins across Kurt's face.
"You're going to wake him," he chastised lightly but there was no reprimand in his voice, no annoyance under the giggly breathlessness that engulfed it.
"Kurt Hummel, you dog," Rachel beamed, grabbing the bag of bagels from him and practically skipping to the kitchen, as though she were floating on the butterflies erupting in his stomach. He shook his head with a laugh and followed her as she dropped down into a chair at the kitchen table and gazed expectantly at him. "So am I finally going to meet the infamous Adam that has had you on cloud nine for weeks? That is him, right?" she added in a quick afterthought, as though suddenly realizing that Kurt might have a whole army of boys at his command.
"No, Rachel, it's Sebastian Smythe," Kurt drawled sarcastically as he settled into the seat across the table from her. "Yes, of course it's Adam."
"Well, come on."
"What?" he inquired innocently, rim of coffee cup pressed against his lips.
"Kurt! Give me all the gory details!"
"Ew, gross. It's not like I ask for any details about what you and Brody get up to."
"Kurt!" Rachel practically screeched and her tone was so indignant that Kurt actually snorted loudly into his coffee.
"Your interest in my sex life is incredibly disconcerning but if you must know, nothing actually happened," he shrugged casually, but a little thrill shot through him nonetheless.
Rachel blinked, looking absurdly put out. "But he's shirtless . . . ?"
"Ah, one of the perks of being a man is that you're at full liberty to sleep in nothing more than a pair of boxers and no one can tell you otherwise," Kurt teased lightly, his voice a little breathless at the memory of waking up curled into Adam's side, Adam's bare skin warm even though the thin fabric of Kurt's T-shirt, the vast expanse of his bare chest rising and falling where Kurt's palm was pressed against his heart, fingers itching to touch and explore. "I don't make the rules, I just take full advantage of the benefits."
Rachel let out an excited noise at the thought of her best friend waking up in the morning next to an attractive, shirtless guy. "Kurt. The way you're talking and you're telling me you haven't jumped his bones yet?"
He shook his head, letting it duck down to his chest bashfully. "No, no we're just . . . I want to take it slow. I like him a lot--so much, Rachel--but . . . You know, after everything that's happened in the past couple of months, I don't want to rush into something."
"But he stayed over," Rachel teased lightly.
"Yeah," Kurt laughed, memory of the previous evening filling his chest with a burst of warmth, "We were on the train coming back from an Apples thing across town and we were just talking so much and laughing so much that we didn't even realize he'd missed his stop until the train pulled up to our station and . . . Why are you looking at me like that?" he broke off as Rachel's smile dropped somewhere midway through his speech and her eyes widened with something akin to horror mixed with pity.
"Kurt," she murmured, her voice suddenly low and cautious as though she was about to break to Kurt the news that a close relative had died, "You're not saying that's the Adam Crawford from Adam's Apples in there?" When Kurt's radiance fell and a single eyebrow rose, she let out a slow breath of air and her brows furrowed together in a look of pity that ignited an immediate spark of irritation in Kurt's blood. "Oh, Kurt. Oh, honey, no--"
"'Oh, honey, no,' what the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Kurt, I told you about the Apples, I told you," Rachel said and where they'd been keeping their voices low so as not to wake, Rachel's was rising back up to her normal volume. "I told you that joining the Apples is social suicide and you decided it would be a good idea to hook up with their leader?"
"Are you kidding me right now?" Kurt demanded, leaning forward, his tone still hushed. "Ten seconds ago you were just about devastated that I hadn't actually slept with the shirtless guy asleep in my bed and now you're acting like I've brought home a rabies-infested stray?"
"When you said you had your eye on someone I never thought your taste had fallen so much as to be interested in Adam Crawford! All amazing, attractive guys at NYADA and you have to choose the one that's probably going to jeopardize your entire career and most resembles a homeless hobo sitting in the dirt in the middle of a London Underground station?"
"Well, I suppose that's probably my cue."
Kurt jumped in his seat when the voice that answered Rachel's wasn't his own but one curved with a British accent and coming from the area of the loft housing Kurt's bed. Even in the secondhand embarrassment that turned his face what must have been an awful shade of red, he felt another one of those unexpected thrills shooting through him at the sight of the Englishman, hair messy in an undeniably sexy way arms strong under his thick plaid shirt where they were crossed over his chest.
He looked startlingly nonplussed given what he'd just overheard and when Kurt tore his gaze from him to Rachel, he was shocked to see that she didn't look the least concerned about the fact that Adam had heard what she'd been saying about him.
"Adam," Kurt started but he didn't even know what to say, instead trying to figure out how on earth he could infuse a single word, a name that already had so much significance, with additional meaning. With "please look at me," and "I'm so sorry," and "she's wrong, don't listen to her, she couldn't be more wrong."
"Charming, but wholly unoriginal, I'm afraid. I must say I expected more from the infamous Rachel Berry," Adam continued smoothly, flexing an arm to push himself off the wall. There was a smile on his face and as he crossed the room Kurt spoke his name again, barely audible and the smile just barely increased, a minute but real upward quirk of the corners of his lips. "It's okay, Kurt."
Kurt opened his mouth to say it wasn't but he couldn't get the proper words out and as he struggled Adam closed the distance between them until he was close enough for Kurt to feel the heat of his body against his skin even with no more physical contact than the light press of his lips against Kurt's cheek and the warmth of his breath against Kurt's ear as he murmured, "I should get going, love."
"You don't have to go. Adam--"
"It's all right, Kurt," Adam reassured loud enough for Rachel to hear, but Kurt didn't catch a clear glimpse of his eyes until he'd pulled back from reaching for one of the cups of coffee, but it was when he did that he truly felt a shiver run down his spine. The smile on Adam's face was truly genuine, it always was. It was as though Adam was incapable of not being genuine, but it was the expression in his eyes, the thread of it woven into the hues of blue of his irises that struck the breath out of Kurt. The incredibly well-hidden sadness and hurt that Kurt would have never even known was there had he not already spent hours staring into Adam's eyes and letting himself drown in the pure radiance there.
The moment and the look were both fleeting and Kurt felt himself frozen in time until they were gone and Adam was turning away toward the door, a hand reaching to pluck his jacket from the hook by the door. The movement of the fabric as Adam swung it over his shoulder and the emotions of Adam's gaze still swimming in front of Kurt's face suddenly mixed dangerously with the unconcerned expression on Rachel's face like a storm front and Kurt felt himself snap.
"You know what, no," he exclaimed so loudly that Rachel got a crink in her neck as her head snapped up to stare at him and Adam paused with a hand on the front door frame, the unfamiliar stiffness in his spine only adding fuel to the burning fire sparking through Kurt's blood. "You stay."
"Kurt," Rachel started loudly, her voice pointedly reprimanding, but before she could get another word out, he rounded on her.
"No, Rachel," he growled. "You listen to me, because I've had it up to here with all your shit since we've been here and I'm done, okay? Done. You're my best friend and I feel like I don't even recognize you anymore! You constantly strut around like you're better than everyone and while that's always been an annoyingly present part of your personality, I've never known you to treat people like they're fucking beneath you--"
"You're being absurd--"
"The Rachel I used to know embraced the fact that she was special! She used to proudly march around in hideous animal-print sweaters and socks with saddle shoes and not giving a fuck because she knew who she was and that's all that mattered! She didn’t walk around shitting on people because they were at the bottom of the food chain because she was that person! She was the lowest of the low and she embraced it! And she was never the conceited little bitch you are now, even to the people that did nothing but put you down!"
Rachel looked positively affronted at this tirade, but before she could even open her mouth to speak, Kurt's fist slammed down on the table and he leaned over it, shoulders tight and chest heaving as every little spark of anger, everything he's been holding back for months suddenly spilling out and he had no power to stop it. "And all your bullshit about the Apples and how they're going to drag me down and ruin my career, are you really so far gone to think that what a bunch of people think of a club means something? Because if that was the case neither one of us should be here because of our sub-basement high school glee club! And in case you forgot, you wouldn't actually be here if it wasn't for the New Directions. You choked on your audition, in case that little detail slipped your mind--"
"Because you just breezed through your audition, didn't you!" Rachel barked back suddenly.
Kurt snorted loudly. "I'm not the one who's acting like I'm suddenly better than that which defined me for three years--"
"Oh please, like it wasn't your constant wish to fit in with everyone--"
"Are you seriously comparing wanting to be treated like a person regardless of my sexual orientation to you acting like a fucking diva?"
"--And honestly you decided to go from dating the most popular guy at Dalton to a nobody like that makes you some sort of martyr--"
"Blaine cheated on me, Rachel!" Kurt yelled, his voice cracking with emotion and the entire apartment was suddenly drenched in silence, Rachel falling back into her seat looking like she'd been slapped, her eyes wide and her cheeks suddenly flushing pink. Kurt paused for breath, leaning over the table and his head falling down in defeat. He was suddenly hyper aware of Adam's gaze on him, his presence in the apartment, all that they knew yet didn't know about each other.
"I love him, Rachel," he said finally, his voice quiet but he wasn't hiding, he wasn't holding back or pretending things weren't the way they were. And he certainly wasn't going to be dishonest to Adam. "He's my best friend and I've forgiven him but he's not perfect. He cheated on me and I don't expect you to fully understand what this means to me considering you and Finn spent the better part of two years constantly hurting each other. His Warbler status never even crossed my mind and he was no better a person as ‘king of the rock stars’ than he was when he was an outcast like us. I love him, and I'm not going to pretend like I'm expecting that to change, but he hurt me. He hurt me and the worst part was was that I was planning forever with him and he ripped that away from me. And it hurt more than anything I've ever felt and it's been hurting for months and it's gotten bearable but it's not going away."
Rachel swallowed and for the first time since the Apples had been brought up she looked slightly abashed, her mouth open in a round little "oh" and her gaze periodically flickering to the figure behind Kurt.
"And I . . . Adam makes me happy," Kurt whispered, his voice low like a prayer that she finally hears him, finally listens. "For months I feel like I've been in this awful limbo of happiness followed by bone-crushing sadness. I saw Blaine for the first time in months only to find out he cheated on me. I saw my dad for the first time in months only to learn he had cancer and I was still trying to learn how to be around Blaine again. But for the first time in weeks, months, I feel alive and it's because of the man you have the gall to tell me is beneath me. When there's no truth at all in that because he is honestly one of the most incredible individuals I've ever met. He reminds me that the only life worth living is one that you're passionate about. He lives his life with so much enthusiasm and positivity it's honestly breathtaking because you'd think that being considered the bottom of the social pyramid would be crushing but he just lives and it honestly makes me feel like I'm floating. And I don't give a shit what other people think because all I see is him and he's undeniably amazing to me."
He sucked in a breath, the apartment apparently shocked into stunned silence. "And you used to be like him and it was one of the things I most admired about you, Rachel Berry. And so right now, my boyfriend and I are going to sit at this table in the apartment you wouldn't even be living in if it weren't for me and we're going to enjoy the coffee and bagels I woke up early to go buy for us and I'm sorry, if you have a problem with him, you can be the one to leave because he is my guest and you have no right to insult him or kick him out of our apartment. Adam, sit."
With a final huff of breath, Kurt felt the energy rush out of his bones and he collapsed down in his seat, his chest heaving and his muscles quivering with bursts of fleeting adrenaline. The silence in the apartment was almost deafening, heavy on his shoulders like a dead weight.
He didn't look at Rachel long enough to to gauge her reaction, barely remembered that Adam was still in the room, the stillness dead-like. No one spoke though had he looked up, he would have seen the quiet glances Rachel kept flashing between himself and Adam.
The only indication he had that Rachel had left was the sudden slow, click of her shoes on the loft floor.
"Errm . . . Kurt, I . . ."
Kurt started in his seat and he leaned back slowly in his seat to look at Adam, an automatic lump forming in his throat at the sight of him, the look that he was giving him that he couldn't quite understand, but which replaced that chill running through his spine with a sudden blossom of warmth in his chest.
"Oh, God, I'm sorry!" Kurt exclaimed suddenly, sitting up in his seat, his eyes widening. "You don't have to stay, you can go if you have to--if you want to--I was just trying to make a point and I was just being bitchy because I haven't had my coffee yet and she's just made me so mad--"
"Kurt," Adam repeated and his voice was stronger that time, laced with an amused laugh and when Kurt looked back at Adam he saw any earlier expressions of sadness and hurt replaced with that unmistakable happiness that always enveloped him. But he was still looking at Kurt with a curious expression, as though he'd discovered at that very moment that Kurt was some rare, mystical creature. "I would absolutely love to stay," he insisted softly, taking several steps toward the table and slowly pulling out the chair Rachel had abandoned.
"Good," Kurt laughed, a little breathlessly, feeling himself finally relaxing as Adam dropped into the chair, his body loose and long as he leaned back, his legs outstretched in front of him so that the toe of his boots nudged against Kurt's shoes.
Kurt swallowed as he met Adam's quiet gaze, the near silence of the apartment no longer stifling but calm, natural and strangely welcoming. He was reminded of their first date, the soft buzz of the coffee shop around them and Adam lounging in his chair across the table from Kurt, fingers playing with his mug so close to Kurt’s that there was an infinite amount of times when Kurt was jolted with the unexpected thrill that Adam might actually take his hand in his own. Adam watching him with that same warm enthusiasm that Kurt had seen him display in everything he did, but it was all so calm, letting Kurt set the pace, letting Kurt be the one to dictate what would happen next, but never allowing awkwardness to filter into the little bubble that they’d found themselves in.
But the expression in Adam’s eyes hadn’t been quite the same then, not so curious, not so simply amazed and now it made Kurt’s breath hitch and his pulse stutter.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” he muttered, feeling the lightest hint of warmth spread across his cheekbones and he busied himself awkwardly with his now-cool cup of coffee.
Adam’s gaze softened and he smiled. “You didn’t have to do that, you know.”
“Oh, trust me, Rachel’s had it coming for a long time--”
“I was more referring to the part about me.”
Kurt blinked and looked up from where he’d been imagining steam rising up from his mug to find Adam still gazing at him, the expression in his eyes shockingly sincere. “Of course I did!” he exclaimed, leaning forward in his seat, unable to quench the amazement that Adam could think otherwise. “I couldn't just let her be a complete bitch to you when she doesn't even know you!"
Adam continued to smile at him, the expression so warm and gentle and recognizably loving that it rocked Kurt to his core because he didn't deserve it, he hasn't done anything to deserve it. "It's really no big deal . . ." he murmured quietly.
Adam tilted his head. "People don't often do that for me--"
"And it's awful for you to have to walk around resigned to the fact that its okay that they treat you like that because they think you're below them," Kurt insisted, leaning forward on his elbows, his face and body as close to Adam as he could get with the table between them and Adam still leaning back in his seat. As though it were with a breach of distance that he could best communicate this.
Adam didn’t answer him for a moment, bright blue eyes slowly scanning Kurt's face, moving over the smooth curves of his brow and dips of his dimples, from freckle to freckle as though he were decoding something in his face and Kurt felt like he was floating in the expression, serene like a cloudless day over the ocean. "You honestly have no idea how special you are, do you? To see people, really see them for who they are, not for who people want you to think they are."
"It was really nothing," Kurt murmured, ducking his head in embarrassment at the compliment, his cheeks a perfect hue of pink.
"Are you honestly as awful at accepting thanks as you are compliments?"
"I'm not--"
"Because we've been here before and I’m insatiably stubborn so we both know how this is going to end," Adam continued with a pointed state and Kurt let out a bark of laughter so strong it caused a brief squeak in the midst of it, and fell back in his seat, raising his arms in surrender.
"All right, okay!" he managed between giggles. He shook his head, smile stretched across his lips and the tiny white pinpricks of his teeth poking out. "Fine, okay, you're welcome."
Adam grinned cheekily and shifted in his seat, the twinkle in his eye rapidly becoming more mischievous. "Thank you. For earlier . . . And for just exposing me to that adorable little squeaky giggle of yours."
"Oh, my God, stop," Kurt groaned loudly, his head falling back to expose the blush spreading along the smooth line of his neck. When Adam guffawed loudly at the reaction Kurt pushed his seat back and snatched the paper bag of bagels from the hand that Adam had been reaching out to claim one. "Just for that, you don't get any of my hard-won bagels," he growled playfully, waving the bag over his head as he danced away from the table.
Adam stared at him in slight disbelief before his expression morphed into one of utter playfulness, his motions. "Your hard-won food that's really cute honey."
Kurt inhaled at the pet name. "You try doing anything around here in the wee hours of the morning." Adam pursed his lips in mock thoughtfulness as he pushed his chair away from the table, his gaze hot and lingering as he did so, his actions cat-like. Kurt felt the rushing build of adrenaline again seeping into his blood and he pretended to busy himself at the sink as Adam approached. "It's a jungle out there."
"Big, tough warrior guy, are you?" Adam murmured and Kurt had barely replied with a slick, "Damn straight," and started to dance a little further away when he felt the anticipated pressure of arms around his waist and he squeaked loudly as Adam spun him around, pinning him against the counter. The presence of his body was suddenly intoxicatingly close, his eyes glistening a thousand shades of blue as he grinned mischievously at Kurt, so close that Kurt could count each individual eyelash.
“There’s that squeak again, so manly,” Adam teased, the tip of his nose brushing against Kurt’s almost playfully to counter the dark heat of his voice, the firm press of his body against Kurt.
“Whatever, I’m fucking hot,” Kurt exhaled, vocal chords barely working with the breach of distance, with the heat that was curling in his stomach at the mere press of Adam’s body against this own, strong arms bracketing his body.
He was mainly joking, but the minute he uttered the words something shifted into Adam’s expression and he pulled away just far enough to fully take in Kurt’s face, that curious, beautifully open and searching expression back on his own, so warm that it sent a wave of flushing heat through Kurt. “You have no idea,” Adam whispered, heat and emotion still present in his voice and before Kurt could say anything in response Adam was leaning forward again and Kurt felt the warm press of his lips, the movement of an arm that had Adam’s fingers moving feather-soft against the fabric of Kurt’s shirt where it hugged his arms, the press of those same fingers into the smooth skin of Kurt’s cheek.
Kurt let out a soft noise, the withheld want escaping into sound, angling his head so that Adam’s fingerprints could become embedded in his skin and he could press them closer, his fingers encircling Adam’s bicep as he allowed himself to be kissed, as he allowed the sweep of Adam’s tongue and the flutter of his lashes against Kurt’s cheek to erase everything that Kurt didn’t care to remember about that morning.
“So, boyfriend?” Adam murmured against, his lips, his kisses so fleeting that they seemed to stir some sort of carnal desire in Kurt, a blossoming warmth that seemed to sizzle and transform into pure want that mixed dangerously with the memories of a far deeper emotion.
“Hmm?”
“Earlier . . .” Adam murmured again, his voice suddenly hesitant. “You said boyfriend.”
Kurt swore softly before he could stop himself and Adam pulled back instantly. “God, Adam, sorry, I didn’t mean to . . . I know we haven’t discussed it and I was just talking again, God, like, bitchy plus no coffee plus Rachel getting on my nerves I didn’t think and-”
“Kurt,” Adam laughed, the palm of his hand still warm and solid along Kurt’s jawbone. His laughter coupled with the way his accent curved the vowels of Kurt’s name did wonders to still the otherwise constant stream of words flowing from Kurt’s mouth, but in the silence that followed Adam again grew curiously thoughtful. “Is that . . . I ask because you’re right, it isn’t something we discussed but . . . I think we’re somewhat doing a fairly good imitation of the whole boyfriend thing right now, so I have to ask . . . is that something you’d want?”
“Yes,” Kurt replied with barely a moment’s hesitation, something which he found startled even himself. He’d never been one to take things slow when it came to falling for guys by any means, but even in the jolting sobriety instilled upon him by Blaine’s cheating he could feel himself falling and even though it scared him, it also made him feel weightless, with no ground in sight. And he’d meant what he said to Rachel: that with everything that had happened and was still happening, the moments that he spent with Adam were some of the happiest that he’d felt in a good long while. “That is . . . if that’s what you want.”
Adam laughed then, that constant, ever present, genuine laugh that seemed to send vibrations of joy all around him and he tightened the arm that was still threaded around Kurt’s waist, pulling Kurt until he’d breached their lines of focus. “I thought I’d made it impossibly clear that I would like nothing more than the honor of dating the extraordinary Mr. Kurt Hummel.”
“You’re so dumb.”
“Hmmm,” Adam hummed in response before leaning in to kiss him again amidst Kurt’s endless giggles.
Pairing: kadam
Rating: PG-13
Summary: "Meanwhile, in New York, Kurt can no longer take Rachel’s arrogant attitude and calls her out, causing tension between the two friends."
Disclaimers: No one is mine. Move along now. Title from "I've Just Seen a Face" by The Beatles.
Spoilers: For 4.14 "Diva"
Kurt’s main worry in trying to ease open their apartment door with two steaming cups of coffee and a bag of bagels in his hand was that he would either wake up everyone inside with the screech of the still-unoiled hinges or that he would successfully open the door but end up spilling both the drinks in his hand. What he failed to accommodate on both counts was the fact that Rachel would be awake and ready to maul him at the door.
"There's a boy in your bed!" was really all he processed before there were arms around him and the both of them nearly went tumbling backwards out onto the concrete floor of the hall outside.
"Rachel!" he hissed as droplets of steaming coffee were flung from a mug in one hand but his annoyance at losing all manner of stealth was quickly dispersed as her words sunk in. There was a boy in his bed. A boy for whom he'd snuck out of bed early to grab fresh bagels and coffee because he was certain the ones they had left in the breadbox were stale. A boy whose very mention painted the widest of grins across Kurt's face.
"You're going to wake him," he chastised lightly but there was no reprimand in his voice, no annoyance under the giggly breathlessness that engulfed it.
"Kurt Hummel, you dog," Rachel beamed, grabbing the bag of bagels from him and practically skipping to the kitchen, as though she were floating on the butterflies erupting in his stomach. He shook his head with a laugh and followed her as she dropped down into a chair at the kitchen table and gazed expectantly at him. "So am I finally going to meet the infamous Adam that has had you on cloud nine for weeks? That is him, right?" she added in a quick afterthought, as though suddenly realizing that Kurt might have a whole army of boys at his command.
"No, Rachel, it's Sebastian Smythe," Kurt drawled sarcastically as he settled into the seat across the table from her. "Yes, of course it's Adam."
"Well, come on."
"What?" he inquired innocently, rim of coffee cup pressed against his lips.
"Kurt! Give me all the gory details!"
"Ew, gross. It's not like I ask for any details about what you and Brody get up to."
"Kurt!" Rachel practically screeched and her tone was so indignant that Kurt actually snorted loudly into his coffee.
"Your interest in my sex life is incredibly disconcerning but if you must know, nothing actually happened," he shrugged casually, but a little thrill shot through him nonetheless.
Rachel blinked, looking absurdly put out. "But he's shirtless . . . ?"
"Ah, one of the perks of being a man is that you're at full liberty to sleep in nothing more than a pair of boxers and no one can tell you otherwise," Kurt teased lightly, his voice a little breathless at the memory of waking up curled into Adam's side, Adam's bare skin warm even though the thin fabric of Kurt's T-shirt, the vast expanse of his bare chest rising and falling where Kurt's palm was pressed against his heart, fingers itching to touch and explore. "I don't make the rules, I just take full advantage of the benefits."
Rachel let out an excited noise at the thought of her best friend waking up in the morning next to an attractive, shirtless guy. "Kurt. The way you're talking and you're telling me you haven't jumped his bones yet?"
He shook his head, letting it duck down to his chest bashfully. "No, no we're just . . . I want to take it slow. I like him a lot--so much, Rachel--but . . . You know, after everything that's happened in the past couple of months, I don't want to rush into something."
"But he stayed over," Rachel teased lightly.
"Yeah," Kurt laughed, memory of the previous evening filling his chest with a burst of warmth, "We were on the train coming back from an Apples thing across town and we were just talking so much and laughing so much that we didn't even realize he'd missed his stop until the train pulled up to our station and . . . Why are you looking at me like that?" he broke off as Rachel's smile dropped somewhere midway through his speech and her eyes widened with something akin to horror mixed with pity.
"Kurt," she murmured, her voice suddenly low and cautious as though she was about to break to Kurt the news that a close relative had died, "You're not saying that's the Adam Crawford from Adam's Apples in there?" When Kurt's radiance fell and a single eyebrow rose, she let out a slow breath of air and her brows furrowed together in a look of pity that ignited an immediate spark of irritation in Kurt's blood. "Oh, Kurt. Oh, honey, no--"
"'Oh, honey, no,' what the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Kurt, I told you about the Apples, I told you," Rachel said and where they'd been keeping their voices low so as not to wake, Rachel's was rising back up to her normal volume. "I told you that joining the Apples is social suicide and you decided it would be a good idea to hook up with their leader?"
"Are you kidding me right now?" Kurt demanded, leaning forward, his tone still hushed. "Ten seconds ago you were just about devastated that I hadn't actually slept with the shirtless guy asleep in my bed and now you're acting like I've brought home a rabies-infested stray?"
"When you said you had your eye on someone I never thought your taste had fallen so much as to be interested in Adam Crawford! All amazing, attractive guys at NYADA and you have to choose the one that's probably going to jeopardize your entire career and most resembles a homeless hobo sitting in the dirt in the middle of a London Underground station?"
"Well, I suppose that's probably my cue."
Kurt jumped in his seat when the voice that answered Rachel's wasn't his own but one curved with a British accent and coming from the area of the loft housing Kurt's bed. Even in the secondhand embarrassment that turned his face what must have been an awful shade of red, he felt another one of those unexpected thrills shooting through him at the sight of the Englishman, hair messy in an undeniably sexy way arms strong under his thick plaid shirt where they were crossed over his chest.
He looked startlingly nonplussed given what he'd just overheard and when Kurt tore his gaze from him to Rachel, he was shocked to see that she didn't look the least concerned about the fact that Adam had heard what she'd been saying about him.
"Adam," Kurt started but he didn't even know what to say, instead trying to figure out how on earth he could infuse a single word, a name that already had so much significance, with additional meaning. With "please look at me," and "I'm so sorry," and "she's wrong, don't listen to her, she couldn't be more wrong."
"Charming, but wholly unoriginal, I'm afraid. I must say I expected more from the infamous Rachel Berry," Adam continued smoothly, flexing an arm to push himself off the wall. There was a smile on his face and as he crossed the room Kurt spoke his name again, barely audible and the smile just barely increased, a minute but real upward quirk of the corners of his lips. "It's okay, Kurt."
Kurt opened his mouth to say it wasn't but he couldn't get the proper words out and as he struggled Adam closed the distance between them until he was close enough for Kurt to feel the heat of his body against his skin even with no more physical contact than the light press of his lips against Kurt's cheek and the warmth of his breath against Kurt's ear as he murmured, "I should get going, love."
"You don't have to go. Adam--"
"It's all right, Kurt," Adam reassured loud enough for Rachel to hear, but Kurt didn't catch a clear glimpse of his eyes until he'd pulled back from reaching for one of the cups of coffee, but it was when he did that he truly felt a shiver run down his spine. The smile on Adam's face was truly genuine, it always was. It was as though Adam was incapable of not being genuine, but it was the expression in his eyes, the thread of it woven into the hues of blue of his irises that struck the breath out of Kurt. The incredibly well-hidden sadness and hurt that Kurt would have never even known was there had he not already spent hours staring into Adam's eyes and letting himself drown in the pure radiance there.
The moment and the look were both fleeting and Kurt felt himself frozen in time until they were gone and Adam was turning away toward the door, a hand reaching to pluck his jacket from the hook by the door. The movement of the fabric as Adam swung it over his shoulder and the emotions of Adam's gaze still swimming in front of Kurt's face suddenly mixed dangerously with the unconcerned expression on Rachel's face like a storm front and Kurt felt himself snap.
"You know what, no," he exclaimed so loudly that Rachel got a crink in her neck as her head snapped up to stare at him and Adam paused with a hand on the front door frame, the unfamiliar stiffness in his spine only adding fuel to the burning fire sparking through Kurt's blood. "You stay."
"Kurt," Rachel started loudly, her voice pointedly reprimanding, but before she could get another word out, he rounded on her.
"No, Rachel," he growled. "You listen to me, because I've had it up to here with all your shit since we've been here and I'm done, okay? Done. You're my best friend and I feel like I don't even recognize you anymore! You constantly strut around like you're better than everyone and while that's always been an annoyingly present part of your personality, I've never known you to treat people like they're fucking beneath you--"
"You're being absurd--"
"The Rachel I used to know embraced the fact that she was special! She used to proudly march around in hideous animal-print sweaters and socks with saddle shoes and not giving a fuck because she knew who she was and that's all that mattered! She didn’t walk around shitting on people because they were at the bottom of the food chain because she was that person! She was the lowest of the low and she embraced it! And she was never the conceited little bitch you are now, even to the people that did nothing but put you down!"
Rachel looked positively affronted at this tirade, but before she could even open her mouth to speak, Kurt's fist slammed down on the table and he leaned over it, shoulders tight and chest heaving as every little spark of anger, everything he's been holding back for months suddenly spilling out and he had no power to stop it. "And all your bullshit about the Apples and how they're going to drag me down and ruin my career, are you really so far gone to think that what a bunch of people think of a club means something? Because if that was the case neither one of us should be here because of our sub-basement high school glee club! And in case you forgot, you wouldn't actually be here if it wasn't for the New Directions. You choked on your audition, in case that little detail slipped your mind--"
"Because you just breezed through your audition, didn't you!" Rachel barked back suddenly.
Kurt snorted loudly. "I'm not the one who's acting like I'm suddenly better than that which defined me for three years--"
"Oh please, like it wasn't your constant wish to fit in with everyone--"
"Are you seriously comparing wanting to be treated like a person regardless of my sexual orientation to you acting like a fucking diva?"
"--And honestly you decided to go from dating the most popular guy at Dalton to a nobody like that makes you some sort of martyr--"
"Blaine cheated on me, Rachel!" Kurt yelled, his voice cracking with emotion and the entire apartment was suddenly drenched in silence, Rachel falling back into her seat looking like she'd been slapped, her eyes wide and her cheeks suddenly flushing pink. Kurt paused for breath, leaning over the table and his head falling down in defeat. He was suddenly hyper aware of Adam's gaze on him, his presence in the apartment, all that they knew yet didn't know about each other.
"I love him, Rachel," he said finally, his voice quiet but he wasn't hiding, he wasn't holding back or pretending things weren't the way they were. And he certainly wasn't going to be dishonest to Adam. "He's my best friend and I've forgiven him but he's not perfect. He cheated on me and I don't expect you to fully understand what this means to me considering you and Finn spent the better part of two years constantly hurting each other. His Warbler status never even crossed my mind and he was no better a person as ‘king of the rock stars’ than he was when he was an outcast like us. I love him, and I'm not going to pretend like I'm expecting that to change, but he hurt me. He hurt me and the worst part was was that I was planning forever with him and he ripped that away from me. And it hurt more than anything I've ever felt and it's been hurting for months and it's gotten bearable but it's not going away."
Rachel swallowed and for the first time since the Apples had been brought up she looked slightly abashed, her mouth open in a round little "oh" and her gaze periodically flickering to the figure behind Kurt.
"And I . . . Adam makes me happy," Kurt whispered, his voice low like a prayer that she finally hears him, finally listens. "For months I feel like I've been in this awful limbo of happiness followed by bone-crushing sadness. I saw Blaine for the first time in months only to find out he cheated on me. I saw my dad for the first time in months only to learn he had cancer and I was still trying to learn how to be around Blaine again. But for the first time in weeks, months, I feel alive and it's because of the man you have the gall to tell me is beneath me. When there's no truth at all in that because he is honestly one of the most incredible individuals I've ever met. He reminds me that the only life worth living is one that you're passionate about. He lives his life with so much enthusiasm and positivity it's honestly breathtaking because you'd think that being considered the bottom of the social pyramid would be crushing but he just lives and it honestly makes me feel like I'm floating. And I don't give a shit what other people think because all I see is him and he's undeniably amazing to me."
He sucked in a breath, the apartment apparently shocked into stunned silence. "And you used to be like him and it was one of the things I most admired about you, Rachel Berry. And so right now, my boyfriend and I are going to sit at this table in the apartment you wouldn't even be living in if it weren't for me and we're going to enjoy the coffee and bagels I woke up early to go buy for us and I'm sorry, if you have a problem with him, you can be the one to leave because he is my guest and you have no right to insult him or kick him out of our apartment. Adam, sit."
With a final huff of breath, Kurt felt the energy rush out of his bones and he collapsed down in his seat, his chest heaving and his muscles quivering with bursts of fleeting adrenaline. The silence in the apartment was almost deafening, heavy on his shoulders like a dead weight.
He didn't look at Rachel long enough to to gauge her reaction, barely remembered that Adam was still in the room, the stillness dead-like. No one spoke though had he looked up, he would have seen the quiet glances Rachel kept flashing between himself and Adam.
The only indication he had that Rachel had left was the sudden slow, click of her shoes on the loft floor.
"Errm . . . Kurt, I . . ."
Kurt started in his seat and he leaned back slowly in his seat to look at Adam, an automatic lump forming in his throat at the sight of him, the look that he was giving him that he couldn't quite understand, but which replaced that chill running through his spine with a sudden blossom of warmth in his chest.
"Oh, God, I'm sorry!" Kurt exclaimed suddenly, sitting up in his seat, his eyes widening. "You don't have to stay, you can go if you have to--if you want to--I was just trying to make a point and I was just being bitchy because I haven't had my coffee yet and she's just made me so mad--"
"Kurt," Adam repeated and his voice was stronger that time, laced with an amused laugh and when Kurt looked back at Adam he saw any earlier expressions of sadness and hurt replaced with that unmistakable happiness that always enveloped him. But he was still looking at Kurt with a curious expression, as though he'd discovered at that very moment that Kurt was some rare, mystical creature. "I would absolutely love to stay," he insisted softly, taking several steps toward the table and slowly pulling out the chair Rachel had abandoned.
"Good," Kurt laughed, a little breathlessly, feeling himself finally relaxing as Adam dropped into the chair, his body loose and long as he leaned back, his legs outstretched in front of him so that the toe of his boots nudged against Kurt's shoes.
Kurt swallowed as he met Adam's quiet gaze, the near silence of the apartment no longer stifling but calm, natural and strangely welcoming. He was reminded of their first date, the soft buzz of the coffee shop around them and Adam lounging in his chair across the table from Kurt, fingers playing with his mug so close to Kurt’s that there was an infinite amount of times when Kurt was jolted with the unexpected thrill that Adam might actually take his hand in his own. Adam watching him with that same warm enthusiasm that Kurt had seen him display in everything he did, but it was all so calm, letting Kurt set the pace, letting Kurt be the one to dictate what would happen next, but never allowing awkwardness to filter into the little bubble that they’d found themselves in.
But the expression in Adam’s eyes hadn’t been quite the same then, not so curious, not so simply amazed and now it made Kurt’s breath hitch and his pulse stutter.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” he muttered, feeling the lightest hint of warmth spread across his cheekbones and he busied himself awkwardly with his now-cool cup of coffee.
Adam’s gaze softened and he smiled. “You didn’t have to do that, you know.”
“Oh, trust me, Rachel’s had it coming for a long time--”
“I was more referring to the part about me.”
Kurt blinked and looked up from where he’d been imagining steam rising up from his mug to find Adam still gazing at him, the expression in his eyes shockingly sincere. “Of course I did!” he exclaimed, leaning forward in his seat, unable to quench the amazement that Adam could think otherwise. “I couldn't just let her be a complete bitch to you when she doesn't even know you!"
Adam continued to smile at him, the expression so warm and gentle and recognizably loving that it rocked Kurt to his core because he didn't deserve it, he hasn't done anything to deserve it. "It's really no big deal . . ." he murmured quietly.
Adam tilted his head. "People don't often do that for me--"
"And it's awful for you to have to walk around resigned to the fact that its okay that they treat you like that because they think you're below them," Kurt insisted, leaning forward on his elbows, his face and body as close to Adam as he could get with the table between them and Adam still leaning back in his seat. As though it were with a breach of distance that he could best communicate this.
Adam didn’t answer him for a moment, bright blue eyes slowly scanning Kurt's face, moving over the smooth curves of his brow and dips of his dimples, from freckle to freckle as though he were decoding something in his face and Kurt felt like he was floating in the expression, serene like a cloudless day over the ocean. "You honestly have no idea how special you are, do you? To see people, really see them for who they are, not for who people want you to think they are."
"It was really nothing," Kurt murmured, ducking his head in embarrassment at the compliment, his cheeks a perfect hue of pink.
"Are you honestly as awful at accepting thanks as you are compliments?"
"I'm not--"
"Because we've been here before and I’m insatiably stubborn so we both know how this is going to end," Adam continued with a pointed state and Kurt let out a bark of laughter so strong it caused a brief squeak in the midst of it, and fell back in his seat, raising his arms in surrender.
"All right, okay!" he managed between giggles. He shook his head, smile stretched across his lips and the tiny white pinpricks of his teeth poking out. "Fine, okay, you're welcome."
Adam grinned cheekily and shifted in his seat, the twinkle in his eye rapidly becoming more mischievous. "Thank you. For earlier . . . And for just exposing me to that adorable little squeaky giggle of yours."
"Oh, my God, stop," Kurt groaned loudly, his head falling back to expose the blush spreading along the smooth line of his neck. When Adam guffawed loudly at the reaction Kurt pushed his seat back and snatched the paper bag of bagels from the hand that Adam had been reaching out to claim one. "Just for that, you don't get any of my hard-won bagels," he growled playfully, waving the bag over his head as he danced away from the table.
Adam stared at him in slight disbelief before his expression morphed into one of utter playfulness, his motions. "Your hard-won food that's really cute honey."
Kurt inhaled at the pet name. "You try doing anything around here in the wee hours of the morning." Adam pursed his lips in mock thoughtfulness as he pushed his chair away from the table, his gaze hot and lingering as he did so, his actions cat-like. Kurt felt the rushing build of adrenaline again seeping into his blood and he pretended to busy himself at the sink as Adam approached. "It's a jungle out there."
"Big, tough warrior guy, are you?" Adam murmured and Kurt had barely replied with a slick, "Damn straight," and started to dance a little further away when he felt the anticipated pressure of arms around his waist and he squeaked loudly as Adam spun him around, pinning him against the counter. The presence of his body was suddenly intoxicatingly close, his eyes glistening a thousand shades of blue as he grinned mischievously at Kurt, so close that Kurt could count each individual eyelash.
“There’s that squeak again, so manly,” Adam teased, the tip of his nose brushing against Kurt’s almost playfully to counter the dark heat of his voice, the firm press of his body against Kurt.
“Whatever, I’m fucking hot,” Kurt exhaled, vocal chords barely working with the breach of distance, with the heat that was curling in his stomach at the mere press of Adam’s body against this own, strong arms bracketing his body.
He was mainly joking, but the minute he uttered the words something shifted into Adam’s expression and he pulled away just far enough to fully take in Kurt’s face, that curious, beautifully open and searching expression back on his own, so warm that it sent a wave of flushing heat through Kurt. “You have no idea,” Adam whispered, heat and emotion still present in his voice and before Kurt could say anything in response Adam was leaning forward again and Kurt felt the warm press of his lips, the movement of an arm that had Adam’s fingers moving feather-soft against the fabric of Kurt’s shirt where it hugged his arms, the press of those same fingers into the smooth skin of Kurt’s cheek.
Kurt let out a soft noise, the withheld want escaping into sound, angling his head so that Adam’s fingerprints could become embedded in his skin and he could press them closer, his fingers encircling Adam’s bicep as he allowed himself to be kissed, as he allowed the sweep of Adam’s tongue and the flutter of his lashes against Kurt’s cheek to erase everything that Kurt didn’t care to remember about that morning.
“So, boyfriend?” Adam murmured against, his lips, his kisses so fleeting that they seemed to stir some sort of carnal desire in Kurt, a blossoming warmth that seemed to sizzle and transform into pure want that mixed dangerously with the memories of a far deeper emotion.
“Hmm?”
“Earlier . . .” Adam murmured again, his voice suddenly hesitant. “You said boyfriend.”
Kurt swore softly before he could stop himself and Adam pulled back instantly. “God, Adam, sorry, I didn’t mean to . . . I know we haven’t discussed it and I was just talking again, God, like, bitchy plus no coffee plus Rachel getting on my nerves I didn’t think and-”
“Kurt,” Adam laughed, the palm of his hand still warm and solid along Kurt’s jawbone. His laughter coupled with the way his accent curved the vowels of Kurt’s name did wonders to still the otherwise constant stream of words flowing from Kurt’s mouth, but in the silence that followed Adam again grew curiously thoughtful. “Is that . . . I ask because you’re right, it isn’t something we discussed but . . . I think we’re somewhat doing a fairly good imitation of the whole boyfriend thing right now, so I have to ask . . . is that something you’d want?”
“Yes,” Kurt replied with barely a moment’s hesitation, something which he found startled even himself. He’d never been one to take things slow when it came to falling for guys by any means, but even in the jolting sobriety instilled upon him by Blaine’s cheating he could feel himself falling and even though it scared him, it also made him feel weightless, with no ground in sight. And he’d meant what he said to Rachel: that with everything that had happened and was still happening, the moments that he spent with Adam were some of the happiest that he’d felt in a good long while. “That is . . . if that’s what you want.”
Adam laughed then, that constant, ever present, genuine laugh that seemed to send vibrations of joy all around him and he tightened the arm that was still threaded around Kurt’s waist, pulling Kurt until he’d breached their lines of focus. “I thought I’d made it impossibly clear that I would like nothing more than the honor of dating the extraordinary Mr. Kurt Hummel.”
“You’re so dumb.”
“Hmmm,” Adam hummed in response before leaning in to kiss him again amidst Kurt’s endless giggles.